Happiness is a choice.

It’s very often in life that solutions are actually quite simple. We will a hear a truth in a very clear and concise way. The problem is that we don’t accept these truths because they’re not what we need to hear at the time. The most infamous example being, “Happiness is a choice”. Now regardless of how true this statement may or may not be, the fact remains that for some? It is truth. For others? Not so much.

Here’s the thing. It is true…ish. Okay. That’s a big ish. Allow me to explain, as people we overcomplicate everything to the point we can’t appreciate any answers anymore because we don’t understand the terribly elaborate equation to get there. What is an answer, a destination, or any achievement without knowing each of the individual steps taken on the journey to get there? It’s nothing really. Meaningless. This explains how we can have all the answers to our struggles in life, without any way to realize them. I mean you always heard it from teach in school. Show your work!

For this reason I would implore each of you to see that just because something may be beyond you right now, don’t dismiss it as a falsehood. As I write this, each of you are taking your own journey with near endless opportunities and potential, but every time you decide something just isn’t possible based on your current perspective, you close off so many paths you could’ve taken. Especially the ones that could lead to happiness being a choice.

Now asking someone to keep an open mind is something of a cliche. I’m sure you’ve all heard that before a million times, but this only demonstrates the timelessness of this wisdom. Life is not that end result we all pursue. It’s the choices we make here and now. Instead of the decidedly unsatisfactory answer of “Happiness is a choice”, I would rather say, “The choice is happiness”. Like all of you, I too am on a journey. One that will only end with my last breath and rather than deciding on what happiness is, I think it’s best to decide on happiness.

It might not make perfect sense right now. It’s not supposed to. I’m still in the middle of solving this equation myself and you know something else? I always will be. Every answer is some theoretical future yet to come that changes with our knowledge. Every judgment we conclude is restricted to that past moment in time as what has already been. Here and now though? That’s as real as it gets. No, I’m not telling you what happiness is. I’m trying to say it’s not something that we can define. Like everything else in this world, it just is… the moment we stop determining what it should be.